How Eshaam Abrahams Went from Taxi Guardjie to Business Owner

This is among our favourite success stories to come out of the Cape Flats, and we think it deserves to be told again and again. Why? Because there is a particular kind of judgment reserved for the taxi guardjie. 

To many people, hanging out of a sliding door and calling out destinations is not a career, it is a dead end. It signals that you did not make it, that you are marking time, that ambition passed you by somewhere along the N2. But Eshaam Abrahams from Manenberg sat in that same sliding door and proved that what others label a dead end can actually be a stepping stone to bigger things.

Abrahams grew up in a one-bedroom council flat in Manenberg where money was a constant source of stress. When his father lost his job at a timber company, the financial pressure on the family intensified at exactly the moment Abrahams needed to be focusing on his mechanical engineering studies at a FET college. Something had to give. He decided he would be the one to help carry the weight. 

How He Became a Guardtjie

Friends of his were already working on minibus taxis, so he joined them as a gaatjie. During school holidays, he worked every single day, morning until late at night. 

The job of a guardtjie was was not just shouting “Athlone, Mowbray, Kaap” out the window.

It was as much about people as it was about transport. He learned how to read a crowd, how to connect quickly with strangers, and how to sell an experience. These were skills he would use for the rest of his life, though he did not know it yet.

He Dropped Out of College But Didn’t Give Up

Balancing college and earning an income eventually became too much, and Eshaam dropped out. While continuing to work on the taxis, he started saving specifically for driving lessons. He wanted more than the door. He passed his licence on the first attempt, became a driver, and by his own words, loved every minute of it. He drove the same routes but saw something new in every passenger and every journey.

Then Landed a Hotel Driver Job and Saw Cape Town for the First Time

After years on the taxi routes, Eshaam was hired as a driver for a top Cape Town hotel. This changed everything he knew about our city. Suddenly he was driving through Constantia, along the wine route, through parts of Cape Town that most people from the Cape Flats never get to see. He swapped his informal route calls for “good morning sir” and watched how tourists moved through the city. It planted a seed. He was already doing what tour guides do. He just did not have the qualification.

He Met a German Businessman Who Changed the Trajectory of His Life

While still working as a hotel driver, Eshaam picked up a German tourist named Thomas Deutschenbaur who needed a lift to a meeting in Blackheath. They talked the whole way there and back. Eshaam told him about Manenberg, the danger people associate with it, and the warmth and tight-knit spirit that actually lives there. By the time the trip ended, Thomas had asked to tour Manenberg himself.

Eshaam took him home to his mother’s place in Colleen Court for pies and samosas, walked him through every corner of the neighbourhood, and even arranged for a local nagtroep and klopse group to perform for him. Thomas had a beer with the locals, celebrated his birthday there, and did not want to leave at the end of the night.

He Was Retrenched and Used This Setback as a Push to Go Independent

When Eshaam dropped Thomas at the airport the next day, Thomas told him he was going to help him start his own business. Eshaam did not quite believe it. But then he got retrenched from his hotel job. He hired a car, started visiting hotels across the city offering discounted tours, and kept in touch with Thomas. A few months later, he got a call from a car dealership in Wynberg. He drove there on Eid to find a silver Toyota Avanza waiting for him, complete with a bow. Thomas had bought it for him, no strings attached.

EA Travel and Tours Takes Off

With the car registered and his tourism qualification in hand, Eshaam launched EA Travel and Tours. His client list grew through word of mouth, covering everyone from Austrian opera singers to Emirati photographers, each of them receiving a personalised experience shaped by his years of reading people and knowing the city.

His vision extended beyond individual tours. He spoke about wanting to eventually employ people from his own community, to give Manenberg’s talented residents a way to channel their abilities into something meaningful rather than losing them to the streets.

His mantra says everything you need to know about the kind of guide he set out to become: “Don’t just be a tourist, be an explorer.”

About The Author